craig

Nice to see some of the draft picks getting some hits recently in Mesa. Vogelbach has been terrible, but Lockhart getting a lot of hits lately, Shoulders had a little burst, Gretzky and Schlecht have gotten some. Even Dunston hasn't been terrible. I think even Trey Martin has gotten a hit lately.

2/3 day jumps his OBP by 8 points and OPS by 42. HR's help stats. A lot.

Day behind, but several thoughts on Szczur. First, he just might not be very good. Many guys, if they aren't great in A, it just gets worse and worse with promotions and better pitching. But, a .355 OBP isn't a bad starting point for a guy with serious leadoff speed and good CF defense. Four reasons why his OBP might get better: 1. LHP. He's got only a .249 OBP versus lefties. That will likely improve. 2. BABIP: .306. Contact hitters with speed often have much higher BABIP's, so that may go up. 3. HR: Zero, he hit 10 last year. Even a few accidental HR's would raise the BABIP. 10 HR over 500 AB is worth 20 OBP points. 4. K-rate. 16% this year, was 11% last year. It might go down. It's not easy to readjust the approach some, with the work-the-count patience stuff. It's possible that he's kind of figuring out how to balance all that and reach a new equilibrium as a hitter. We'll see how the season unfolds. But .355 OBP isn't that bad a starting point, when he hasn't seemed to have much of anything (HR, BABIP...) working in it's favor thus far. I think it's more likely to get better than to get worse as the season progresses at Daytona.

I think multi-position guys tend to be guys who have fairly decent instincts defensively. May not be really gifted at any individual position, but can usually catch whatever they can reach, throw the ball straight, and read the ball OK anywhere. Bellhorn, DeRosa, Jose Hernandez, Theriot, they tended to be fairly instinctive and competent wherever you played them. Not great anywhere, and maybe short on range or arm for some of the positions they played at, but they wouldn't be embarrassing themselves. They could catch what they could get to and throw the ball straight no matter where you put them. I get the impression that Lake seems rather non-instinctive defensively and may not be competent at either catching the ball or throwing the ball straight at present from any position, much less expecting him to do so from five positions. I think he might end up needing to kind of memorize how to play one or two positions. Hopefully he'll end up being quite good at either 3rd or RF. And will hit enough so that we'll want him to play.

By many accounts, he's a lot taller/bigger than 6'2" now. I think RF would make a lot of sense, if he hits enough. He may resemble Soriano. Great arm, fast, athletic, the tools would seem to profile great in RF. Soriano had great infield tools, but never became even a decent infielder. Great outfield tools, but never became a good outfielder either. Hopefully Lake with practice and experience will get good, or at least acceptable, somewhere.

His BA-non-BIP is .318 at present. His K/HR ratio is around 2:1. So even if his BABIP relaxed to a more average number, he'd still be hitting around .320.

His curve and change both have the potential to be plus pitches. I thought I'd read some report that his 2-seamer has some decent sink? Not really? Most outs are made with movement, not velocity. If a guy can command both curve and change, he's got a chance. In my naive experience, though, nobody commands everything all the time, and then you get slaughtered when you're not on your game. (I think this has been something of Rusin's history; he pitches quite a few good games, but when he's bad he's really bad.) I always worry some about the "Micah Bowie" factor, too. Some of you will remember Bowie, lefty curveballer with good minor-league numbers. And in minors he got to enough 2-strike counts to score K's. But in the majors, he was scared to throw his fastball over the plate, and the hitters would just lay off his curveball, which didn't all that often actually go for strikes. So he was pitching 2-0, 3-1 all the time so they had no reason to suck for his curveballs. Rusin has somehow never walked a lot of guys. So either his offspeed stuff must have pretty good "get me over" ability, or else whatever his velocity lacks, he's still able to throw it for strikes. He's hot right now, so I'm interested. But good chance he'll have a big-league career, but as a lefty reliever. His Loogy splits this year are pretty striking.

On Lake, I don't think he's even close to castro defensively, nor does he project as well. The board consensus is that there is no rush to move him. I agree and disagree. It may be true that there is no rush, but that might be assuming either that he's never going to be more than a minor league journeyman, or else that he'll need multiple more developmental years in the minors anyway, such that there is little reason to prepare him for the position(s) he might play in the majors as either a starter or a utility player. He's not been a quick study defensively. So I don't think it makes sense that when he's struggled to become fundamentally sound at SS after 5 years of instruction, that suddenly 5 weeks or even 5 months is going to make him a fundamentally sound, intelligent, smooth player at 2B or 3B, or both. It's likely going to take him at least a year to become even slightly better than "raw" at any new infield position, I'd think. I can see the logic of letting such a raw hitter stay stable defensively, so that he can perhaps focus for this season on his hitting. And then give him 2013 to work on a new position, such that perhaps at some point in 2014 he'd be ready enough defensively for a callup. But I'd think if we have any real hopes of having him big-league ready-to-stay at some point in late 2013, you oughta get him to a big-league position defensively ASAP. Probably only an issue, though, if he improves a lot as a power hitter. If he's a so-so raw hitter, which positions he can't play defensively might not matter much.

Jackson may have been on a "chucker" in 08-09, but he got a lot of K's and outs and walked very few. IN 2010-2012, he's been terrible, with very few K's, and a hit-allowing machine, and lots of HR's. If 2010 Jackson was the "improved' version, there was little hint of that based on his K-rates or actual effectiveness. He was a prospect at one point because he had a good fastball, excellent K/BB results, and good results in general, and he was young. Now that he's old, has terrible K/BB/HR results, has a hit-machine fastball, and that's his best pitch, I'd stick a fork in him. He may need to try to stretch out his pro career in a lower-than AAA level, as a journeyman reliever, or in Indy Ball. But not much indication that he has any of the qualities that could make him even a sub-average big-leaguer reliever. IMO.

Wells has given up 24 hits in 17 innings. Maybe he's been really unlucky, or maybe he's serving up a lot of whackable strikes. He's given up 18 runs in 17 innings. Minor league pitchers sometimes get deceptively low ERA's because so many of the runs they allow get ignored as unearned. You know, get two outs, walk the bases loaded, have a fielder make an error, then give up five more hits before getting an out. Some terrible pitching, but it helps your ERA because they all list as unearned. Not saying Wells has been like that, but it's a given that ERA's tend to be deceptively low for groundball pitchers because groundballs cause a lot more errors than flies. I'd had a lot of hopes for him entering this season, but 18 runs allowed in 17 April innings in cold Midwest League may involve more than just bad luck.

I think Francescon's gotten a full workload, he just hasn't been as consistently pitch-efficient as Jensen. Jensen's allowed few walks and few hits, and he hasn't worked lots of long-count K-AB's either. Francescon as gone relatively deep in three of his four starts. 7 innings today when he was cruising ala Jensen. 4.2 his first outing, despite 9 K's. That's pretty full under their opening pitch count. 5.2 his second start, again pretty long given pitch counts. It was really one start 3 which was short, but I'm guessing with three walks and three hits, he was laboring and probably exhausted his count before finishing the 4th. I'm also speculating that his 3rd start was also subject to the early-April unexpanded pitch count limits. Wang has been excellent. 1 hit and 1 walk in 8 innings. Cruz has been terrible, as wild as always and his velocity seems to be declining rather than improving. And Liria, as you say, seems to be wild and unimproved. Rosario hasn't been much either.

I sure do. I think he has the tools, if he can refine them. And he and Castro could be a super good-hitting middle of the infield. If you've got a couple of #3-type hitters playing middle infield, image how strong of a batting lineup you could have. Tools-wise, neither would seem underqualified defensively. I wonder whether Castro might benefit from a move to 2B. The shorter throw could bail him out of a lot of throwing errors.

I wonder if Carlos Silva might be a pretty good comp for Wells? Of course, Wells is young, so who knows what he might come up with in future.

1. Phil gets referenced often enough (and helpfully so, because there's often all kinds of interesting stuff in his articles or the followup discussions). As TT said, it's a non-issue, since we all know that any info from Arizona is basically coming from him. 2. Silva: toonster, I was surprised that you mentioned negative 2B reports, because I'd thought he'd hardly played there enough to make any judgments. But after checking back, he did appear in over 20 games at 2B last year. I'm curious how many sources and how close your sources are, if you can share that? Because often you seem to be getting different input from what I'm hearing (several-hands info.) I've heard that Silva has looked quite good at 2B this spring. 3. I've also heard that Baez has looked impressive at SS. If his defense is better or at least as good as Hernandez's, and his offense is way better, then they wouldn't/shouldn't have any Baez decisions impacted by Hernandez. To train him at 2B or 3B because Castro has SS locked down long-term, at some point that could make sense. But I don't think you'd move Baez to 2B or 3B on account of Marco Hernandez. At least, not until/unless Marco shows strong indications that he's a comparable or better prospect, or until/unless Baez shows signs that he's unqualified to play a good big-league SS. Certainly I hope that in a year or two, it's looking like: a) Castro is a superstar and that his SS defense is very good and that he's not going to outgrow the position b) That Baez is a stud prospect and that his SS defense is excellent and capable, even relative to the incredibly high big-league norm c) That Hernandez is also looking like a gifted, above-average big-league defensive SS with an asset bat besides. We should be so lucky as to sit with three excellent-hitting good-defense SS's in their low 20's, huh?

Pitchers get injured, that goes with the territory. He's not the first or the last guy to lose a bunch of velocity at some point, for whatever reason. It appears that he's got some promising control, breaking pitches, and a diverse arsenal. If he had Struck's velocity he'd probably be a very, very nice prospect. But with no velocity, different story. If later on he's 6 mph faster, he'll probably be pretty interesting. But, arms get damaged and while sometimes velocity does return at some point, it's certainly not so likely and not to be expected.

I've heard that Baez has looked fantastic at SS, and that within the org talk about moving him is gone. That may be for now, of course, so perhaps that may change later if/when his body changes. And my source is fourth hand. But I guess he's looked much better than anybody expected, we knew he had a strong arm but apparently he's very quick and has impressive range. Note: Of course I understand he's 19 now, and a lot of guys don't have the same size, quickness, or flexibility at 27 that they had at 19. So I'm not at all suggesting that he might not outgrow the position. But for the moment, my understanding is that they think his current defensive aptitude at SS is excellent. I had completely expected Hernandez to jump to Peoria. He's had two full pro years, and he's hit for average in both of them. If as a contact hitter A- is too much for him and he's overmatched, it's not obvious that another round of XST/Arizona/short-season is going to help all that much. Of course every hitter goes through slumps and bad luck stretches, and even good hitters who put up .300+ seasons will have a couple of weeks where they OBP and slug below .100. Plus hitting in 40-degree weather when pitchers are cool and strong isn't easy for any hitter. So I think it's way too early to write off Hernandez as a hitter.

All seven of Vitters hits have been singles thus far.

Heh, dress warm and enjoy the opener. Glad to see Cates listing for tonight, I'd thought there had been some question about whether he was healthy... Hopefully he starts well. So, if I'm remembering correctly, that will be Loosen-Jokisch-Simpson-Cates for Daytona. Leaving Concepcion/Kirk as the fifth starter candidates. I'm curious whether Concepcion really will be starting tomorrow, and if so how low his pitch count might be. Well, and I guess I'm also curious whether he'll be effective.

Thanks much, UK. Very helpful, and thanks for the detail.

Any gun on Rosario? Any hint of an obvious and effective breaking ball? (I know for a lot of slider guys, it's hard to distinguish the slider from their 2-seamer or whatever.) Did Liria or Wang have any noteworthy breaking pitches?

There has been talk of Beeler being a guy who might break out. And some talk of him having an improved and effective slider to go with his sinker. But as with last year, no K's and piles of hits.

I also hope it's the last time we spend a first on a guy who we see throw a complete game one night in a college tournament and then have him come back the same weekend to pitch relief, even if he is in the mid-90's the 2-3 days later. The very usage that really showed him off to Wilken may have also been the very weekend that messed up his arm. The radio announcer was saying that he had pin-point control early on with both fastball and breaking stuff. I know there were reports that he was throwing 94 comfortably in Arizona this winter/spring, but I'd been told that the velocity disappeared over the course of camp.

Wang relieves Rosario after 5.1. Rosario allows only two hits, and has a 12/2 G/A ratio. Interesting numbers, he must have gotten a lot of quick groundouts to pitch into the 6th innings on the first-week pitch counts. Although 3 walks and a HBP and only 2 K's isn't super impressive. Wang (1.2), Reed (1.0), and McKirihan (1.0) provide 3.2 innings of perfect relief.

I had the same question. To some degree, it really doesn't matter early in the year. The starters rarely go 5 innings, so there are gobs of innings for a reliever. If a guy is pitching half-way well, he can pick up 2 or 3 innings at a crack in relief, and by May 15 you can hardly differentiate the starters from the relievers in terms of innings. It almost matters more as a reflection of how the org projects a guy. Good outing for Jokisch, nice to see Zych and Antigua and Cabrera and Beliveau do well. My guy Cruz was bad. Will look forward to UK's scouting on Francescon.

toonster, how much do you know about struck? My recall of what I've heard scouting-wise is that he throws a lot of fastballs, and hasn't had any consistent or high quality breaking pitch. Lots of fastballs with some so-so sliders mixed in. Which could fit his crummy results at Iowa. I don't think it's necessarily wise to focus too much on the Iowa numbers. It was premature for Fleita to rush him up to AAA already last year, at age 21 in only his 2nd year as a pro. Hardly astonishing that he was bad there. At Daytona/Tennessee, he was 2.96 ERA / 73K/22BB/85IP/2 HR. Those are very good numbers for a 21-year-old, and normally suggest at least some degree of prospect-hood. But he's gotten little buzz, and for a system as weak as the Cubs, he didn't seem to even sniff BA's top-30 despite numbers like that as a 21-year-old. However he's doing it, it didn't appeal to scouts that much. So some things don't really seem to add up. As important as any characteristic for a pitcher is a low-HR profile, and Struck seems to have that. Which seems unusual if a guy is throwing too many fastballs and hitters can often sit on those, even in the A+/AA levels. My sense is that his velocity is good, but it's not like he's Cashner or Carpenter or overpoweringly fast. Perhaps either his location or his fastball movement are pretty good, or both? Maybe the brilliant Fleita figured he threw too many fastballs, and pushed him up to Iowa just to force him to fail and to learn for himself that doing it that was wasn't going to work. So maybe his slider will be a little sharper and more consistent, he'll throw more of them, maybe he's taking to an effective cutter, and you'll have a new and improved man this year? It's spring, always fun to hope.